Natalie Haynes - The Amber Fury

Rating: 4/5

Review:
Very good

I thought this was a very good book. I tried it because I like Natalie Haynes's work as a critic, broadcaster and comedian but I wasn't sure she would be a good novelist. She is. The book has its flaws, but I thought it was very well written, involving for much of the time and full of intelligence and insight.

The story is of Alex, a recently bereaved young woman who moves from London to Edinburgh to escape the scene of her grief and begins to teach Greek Tragedy to a small class of "difficult" 15-year-olds in a behavioural unit. The story unfolds in two first-person narratives, that of Alex herself and Mel, one of her students. I don't want to spoil the plot by telling the story, but I found it very involving in the way Alex deals (and fails to deal) with her grief and the way in which Mel responds to Alex and what she is teaching. It is clear from the beginning that the story is heading in a dark, tragic direction and Natalie Haynes generates a fine sense of menace and tension which drives the narrative very well.

One of the book's great strengths is the sharp, often witty observations of both narrators, like Alex saying "I couldn't deal with perky can-I-help-you shop assistants. I couldn't deal with sullen why-should-I-help-you-I-didn't-ask-to-be-born ones either," which both neatly sums up Alex's state of mind and also stops it becoming turgid and impenetrable. I think Haynes gets the tricky balance just right and it's a fine, readable portrait of grief and its slow progression. I also found Mel's deafness very well portrayed and her descriptions of how others behave toward her shrewd and telling.

I did have some problems with the book. For example, Natalie Haynes describes parts of Edinburgh in minute detail, yet she somehow failed to give me much of a sense of the place, and, having taught some pretty "difficult" students myself, I found her idea of how students like that would respond to reading Aeschylus rather too rosy for credibility. More seriously, Mel's voice simply isn't that of a 15- or 16-year-old. She is too wise and articulate for this to be credible and, although they are often translated into teenage phrases, the observations and thoughts are very obviously the author's and not those of a "difficult" mid-teen girl. Even reading the book with enjoyment and good will, I found this an obstacle to really believing it.

Nonetheless, I would warmly recommend this book. In spite of its flaws, I found it engaging and gripping much of the time and it has genuine insights to offer, presented with wit and humanity. I think Natalie Haynes has real talent and I look forward to more novels from her.